Heart Rate and Weightloss in Seniors

Does the heart rate determine weight loss for seniors?

“I go to my local health club and walk on the treadmill. Is there a certain heart beat rate that I should try to get to in order to lose weight? I have been losing a pound (0.5kg) a week but I think that is more due to eating less. Also anything to help to flatten a stomach?”

There are a few things I want to touch on with Jan's questions.

Number 1) Jan made comment about her weight loss may be from eating less.

My comment: 80% of losing weight is about the food you are putting into your body.
If you’re eating too much food (too many calories), you’re going to find it very, very difficult to lose weight just with exercise.

Make sure you’re eating healthy food and not overeating and, like Jan, you’ll see results.

(In the future I plan on giving information and videos on nutrition for seniors so keep an eye out for this)

Number 2) Jan asked if there is a certain heartbeat rate she should be exercising at to lose weight.

My comment: A great question. Many fitness trainers would say that you want to keep your heart rate in a “FAT BURNING” zone, but I disagree with this. There is no “FAT BURNING” zone you need to stick to when exercising.

However… When exercising we DO want to elevate our heart rate to get the health benefits and burn calories, which will help lose weight.

So what do we elevate our heart rate to?

I recommend exercising in the zone of 60-80% of your max heart rate for the duration of your exercise session.

This may sound complicated, but it actually isn't.

To get your max heart rate, you’re going to put your age into the following formula.

Max Heart Rate = 208 – 0.7(age)

Let take a look at an example: I'm going to pick the age of 70.

Putting Joe's age into the formula: Max Heart Rate = 208 – 0.7(70)

We get 159.

Now when we find 60-80% of this we get the following:

60% = 95 beats per minute
80% = 127 beats per minute

For someone aged 70, they will aim to keep their heart rate between 95 beats to 127 beats per minute for the duration of their exercise session.

When we exercise at 60-80% intensity and combine our exercise with healthy eating we will lose fat and get many health benefits.

Also to touch on the question of flattened stomach's when we lose fat from our body overall, eventually our stomachs will flatten.

As you can see Jan combined her exercising with “eating less” and she is seeing results. Great work Jan!

Now, if you’re like Jan (or me) and like to track and follow numbers when exercising, it’s easy to track if you have a heart rate monitor or you use a treadmill (or other exercise equipment) that tracks your heart rate.

If you don’t have this equipment however, I have created a table known as a Rating of Perceived Exertion (RPE) table which can be printed off and makes it easy for you to track how hard you are exercising.

DOWNLOAD RPE TABLE HERE

From this RPE table you can determine the effort (or exertion) you are putting in when exercising by matching up how you feel during exercise and your % of Max Heart Rate.

This table gives you an easy way to determine how much effort you are putting into the exercise and it is worth printing off, familiarising yourself with, and using during your exercise sessions.

To know if you are at 60% of your max heart rate it basically means you are sweating minimally and can easily hold a conversation. As the effort of the exercise increases your heart rate will begin to climb until you get to 80% max heart rate. At 80% of your max heart rate you'll be sweating, can still hold a conversation but with difficulty.

Anything below 60% is still exercise and it has its place for the health benefits. Anything above 80% is not required for seniors.

Well, I hope the above made sense to you. It can be confusing until you get used to it.

Enter your age into the formula and work out 60-80% of your max heart rate and try to stick to this next time you go for a walk, cycle, etc.

If tracking numbers is not something you are interested in, that’s fine also. Just get moving! Get out there and enjoy it. Be happy and if you’re ready to think about different ways of exercising you can do the above also.

- Mike

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